Tag Archives: water

Education Film 38b: Zika Virus and You

The Zika-spreading mosquito Aedes aegypti takes a bloodmeal.
The Zika-spreading mosquito Aedes aegypti takes a bloodmeal. Photo courtesy CDC.

Zika virus is spreading through a hemisphere with plenty of mosquito habitat and no immunity to the disease, and summer is on its way. But what really chills the blood and drives our dread of what was once considered “dengue’s wimpy cousin” is the virus’s horrifying, yet unproven, link to infant microcephaly.

And so, even as epidemiologists struggle to contain and understand the problem, the news swarms with disturbing images and calls for wiping out the offending mosquito vectors. Clearly, if we’re going to get through this, we need to do our homework. Why not start with my article, in which I cut through the buzz to explore …

How Zika Virus Works

Marine Biology Breakthroughs: I Cover the Waterfront

Photo of coral, goldies and and two divers
Photo by Derek Keats.

In honor of World Oceans Day (June 8), here’s my recent article on some of the remarkable discoveries made by marine biologists over the past few years. From clearing up the murky “lost years” of juvenile turtles to further solidifying our understanding of a jellyfish’s final fate, these delvers of the deep have shrunk what Shakespeare called “the vasty deep” to something a bit more fathomable but no less amazing. Find out more as I take a deep dive into …

10 Recent Breakthroughs in Marine Biology

Mars in a Nutshell

Think you know everything about Mars. eh?

We live in a golden age of Mars exploration, an era of unprecedented knowledge brought to us by ingenious rovers and probes. Already we have learned that our diminutive neighbor once held water and perhaps life. Future missions will help determine where that water went and seek evidence deep beneath the surface of living creatures. One day, we might even go there ourselves. But how much have you kept up on the latest developments?

How Mars Works

For green energy, there’s no place like loam

Diagram of PMFC
Diagram by KVDP

Petroleum use is rife with environmental and security issues, and first-generation biofuels fall well short of carbon neutrality. Moreover, as global food crops literally lose ground to biofuel production, mounting scarcity is driving up food prices, increasing global hunger and political instability.

But what if we could have our rice and burn it, too? What if we could derive energy from crops without killing them, or generate power using plants and land not needed for food, all through the power of microbes?

How Plant-microbial Fuel Cells Work

The ins and outs of the antipodean swirlie

Maelstrom
Maelstrom by Henry Clark.

If you’re an Aussie dag and some bogan is giving you a dunnyflushing, why not spend the time constructively? Watch which way the water swirls down the bog, and then call one of your nerdier Yank mates and compare notes on swirlie physics. Will this settle the age-old argument? Hardly. But, hey, it’s something to pass the time.

Does Water in a Drain Go a Different Direction in the Southern Hemisphere?